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Judge Suppresses Report On Voting Systems
Posted by
kdawson
on Fri Oct 03, 2008 07:20 AM
from the tell-me-but-don't-tell-them dept.
from the tell-me-but-don't-tell-them dept.
Irvu writes "A New Jersey Superior Court Judge has prohibited the release of an analysis conducted on the Sequoia AVC Advantage voting system. This report arose out of a lawsuit challenging on constitutional grounds the use of these systems. The study was conducted by Andrew Appel on behalf of the plaintiffs, after the judge in the case ordered the company to permit it. That same judge has now withheld it indefinitely from the public record on a verbal order."
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Politics: Damning Report On Sequoia E-Voting Machine Security 200 comments
TechDirt notes the publication of the New Jersey voting machine study, the attempted suppression of which we have been discussing for a while now. The paper that the Princeton and Lehigh University researchers are releasing, as permitted by the Court, is "the same as the Court's redacted version, but with a few introductory paragraphs about the court case, Gusciora v. Corzine." What's new is the release of a 90-minute evidentiary video — the researchers have asked the court for permission to release a shorter version that hits the high points, as the high-res video is about 1 GB in size. See TechDirt's article for the report's executive summary listing eight ways the AVC Advantage 9.00 voting machine can be subverted.
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Wikileaks? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Wikileaks? (Score:5, Interesting)
The restraining order is temporary until arguments can be heard. If we weren't so close to the election a better strategy would be to wait and argue it in court. No need to make the judge angry or risk a contempt of court charge by leaking it.
With it so close to the election though, those arguments may not be heard soon enough. (OTOH, it may already be to close for the report to make any difference anyway.)
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Re:Wikileaks? (Score:5, Interesting)
I am sure I am not the only one who thinks that the consideration here shouldn't be "what do we do about these issues, given the date of the election?" but "what do we do with the date of the election, given these issues?"
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Re:Wikileaks? (Score:5, Interesting)
Easy, you throw out the voting machines and manually tabulate votes, its real fucking easy, you have a written/typed ballot, the poll monitor records the vote on a running vote list as the votes are handed in, then the votes are hand counted later that evening, totals on the poll working tabulation are compared to hand count totals, recounts conducted as necessary.
All handcounts are done under public video surveillance from multiple angles done by multiple sources (eg. web based camera, cspan camera, government run camera, 2 LOCAL news station cameras, and 2 national news station cameras.)
Hows that sound? (Yeah, theres a few more details and possible steps to shore up security of the votes, but its just a first outline)
Cheers.
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Not quite, the votes ARE tallied onsite, and tallied AGAIN centrally. Security of ballots should be handled by State Police and under the observation of a state judge. GPS tracking of state police trucks picking up and transferring ballots, along with physical, live video broadcasts would cover that. Its a bit excessive but it could work.
Theres only so much one can do to protect the vote, the logistics of poll site based final ballot tallying and recounts are a real pita to manage. Nothing is going to be
Re:Wikileaks? (Score:5, Insightful)
I've somewhere read a quote, "For a tyrant, any excuse is sufficient." Do we really want to give elected officials any plausible excuse for delaying elections? Delaying elections is a favorite tactic of autocrats that want to stay in power while pretending to support democracy.
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Re:Wikileaks? I Agree, but I don't vote anymore... (Score:5, Insightful)
If a Puppet-POTUS/POTUS can be purchased, then they are bought and sold.
If a politician can be purchased, then they are bought and sold.
If a DoJ AG can be purchased, then they are bought and sold.
If a judge can be purchased, then they are bought and sold.
It ain't democracy, but what is good for a Czar, is good for a PPOTUS....
Folks, it is just politics for US. Democracy with word-spin, says we vote for selected politicians that support trickle-up (nothing trickles2US) economics for the wealthy. It puts less folks to work and more folks into bankruptcy, but all the money-changers in Washington know how to lovingly squeeze US all to death. It ain't treason ... it is the American Banana Republic (US, Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela...) way of life.
The $1US of ten years ago now has the international purchase value of about $0.25US. The PPOTUS's and leaders of the last 20+ years presided over the fall of US telecom, medical, auto, education, life quality.... Lets not blame the terrorist ... like me they don't even vote (they never did).
I gave up voting after Ronnie's election, and politicians are always happy to lose a voted, but never election. Our separate-but-equal medicine, education, food, shelter, safety, income... is a cast culture with the wealthy few taking more every day ... next nepotist payroll is $700B ... it won't be the last; So, don't FUS is not a possible reality for US children ... expect the same that their parents and grand-parents will get the next few+ decades.
!HAVEFUN!
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Re:Gag order vs. date of election (Score:4, Insightful)
Not to mention that changing the date of the (presidential) election would require a constitutional amendment.
The only benign explanation I can think of is that the study describes ways to exploit the voting machines for election fraud, and in the view of the court there is no way to remedy the vulnerabilities before the election. Frankly, I'd prefer that wikileaks leave this one alone for a few weeks. As a short-term solution, sometimes security through obscurity is your only option.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
what do we do with the date of the election, given these issues?
It's better to have a flawed election rather than none at all. There are mechanisms already in place where a candidate take court action to have an election voided if evidence is presented indicating that malfunctioning equipment and/or fraud significantly altered the results. If a judge voids an election, he or she will order a new one and perhaps specify conditions to better assure a clean revote. Such conditions can involve exclusion of questionable equipment or mandate tried-and-true voting technique
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Maybe so, but a New Jersey judge has no authority to do so. Article I Section 4 and Article II Section 1 of the US Constitution give ultimate authority over the time of elections to Congress. The Congressional and Presidential elections must occur the Tuesday after the first Monday in November according to 2 USC 1, 2 USC 7 and 3 USC 1 (3 USC 2 seems to give a little wriggle room, but only for Electors).
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"Stop throwing the Constitution in my face! It's just a goddamn piece of paper!" - George W. Bush
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The fact that it's so close to an election is due to massive incompetence by the government in not doing comprehensive studies sooner. It's not as if there hasn't been plenty of evidence that such a study needed to be done since 2000 or so. I'm frankly a bit surprised that Bush hasn't publicised this and declared a national emergency in order to address it, suspending the elections for a couple of years.
If this study provides evidence that the election could easily be a sham, what exactly is the point o
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Wikileaks? (Score:5, Insightful)
Hmm... This looks like a job for wikileaks. Couldn't be too hard to find. Has it been posted at all? If so, could a quick google archive search prove useful? I would be very interested to see the results of this study, and would be even more interested to know this judge's reasoning behind withholding it.
Violating the court order and posting the report to Wikileaks might soun good, but would be very counterproductive in the end.
First. it is very likely that the order may be lifted after arguments are heard. Violating a direct court order is going to extremely annoy the judge; judges do not take well to people disobeying direct court orders. The correct way to deal with it is to contest the order, and argue it out.
Second, Appel has been given access to the source code. The only way he was given this access was by the court having guaranteed to the vendor that they would not release trade secrets to the public. If Appel demonstrates that he does not consider himself bound by the court orders, do you think that he will ever be given the chance to examine source code, from any vendor, ever again? Do you think that anybody will ever be given the opportunity to examine source code? Consider the following conversation sometime in the future
"Your honor, you tell me that if we give the plaintiffs access to the source code of our voting machines, it will remain sealed under court order. However, in the case 'New Jersey versus Sequoia AVC' the court gave the vendor exactly that guarantee, but the plaintiffs recklessly disobeyed the court order. Why should you believe their promises, when they have demonstrated that they do not consider bound by promises they make in a court of law?"
The correct answer is, argue it out. Don't piss the judge off. Make it clear that the good guys are the ones who obey the rule of law, and the bad guys are the ones who are contemptuous of it.
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Re:Wikileaks? (Score:5, Insightful)
>If Appel demonstrates that he does not consider himself bound by the court orders, do you think that he will ever be given the chance to examine source code, from any vendor, ever again? Do you think that anybody will ever be given the opportunity to examine source code?
The whole question should be irrelevant - you should not be able to run something as vital as election using a piece of proprietary software. If they don't want to show the code - they should have no chance at getting the contract in a first place. But thanks to narrow-minded (at best) choices made by politicians we are now in a position where we have to choose between due process and fair election. Disgraceful!
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
The whole question should be irrelevant - you should not be able to run something as vital as election using a piece of proprietary software. If they don't want to show the code - they should have no chance at getting the contract in a first place. But thanks to narrow-minded (at best) choices made by politicians we are now in a position where we have to choose between due process and fair election. Disgraceful!
Yes, I agree with that completely. Source code for vote counting should be available for any citizen to inspect, at any time, for any reason, without a court order.
Addition is not a trade secret.
However, given that we don't live in a world where the source code can be inspected without a court order, having an expert witness violate an explicit court order would, almost certainly, result in a world where the source code wouldn't be available for inspection even with a court order.
Re:Wikileaks? (Score:4, Interesting)
Limiting the release of information from a court case can be appropriate. According to Appel, the judge suppressed the report after Sequoia "grossly mischaracterized" the report, which I bet means they claimed it gratuitously revealed trade secrets. If lawsuits could be used to fish for information about trade secrets, that would be very bad news for small companies trying to compete with rich ones like Microsoft and IBM.
Hopefully the judge only suppressed the report to give herself time to examine the merit of Sequoia's claim. (Also, hopefully she rejects their claim and releases the report quickly enough to make a difference in this election.)
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this does not look good for the judge. (Score:5, Insightful)
With things the way they are right now, this judge should think again.
We already know that e-voting systems suffer from ridiculous flaws that were in-built.
This report might show that. The judge is seriously playing for the wrong team here.
Re:this does not look good for the judge. (Score:4, Insightful)
The report does not say he's not allowing the findings to be used in the court room, he's just making sure the findings are not public record.
It's likely clear that not only a fault was identified, but a relatively easy to exploit one, and in the light of the short time between now and the election, he's basically got to place a gag order to avoid any potential for abuse of the voting systems 4 weeks from now.
He's playing on the right team here. It's far too late to fix it, we have to ride this election through. Preventing this information from getting out, while allowing the court case to continue, is in everone's best interests. He can release the information after NJ has successfully replaced the machines, after the court case is over, after the fine is issued and they have time to fix it.
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
If this information comes out after the election and it does turn out there was a really simple-to-exploit flaw, it should void the results of all these machines.
I'm not holding my breath for that though (and why would I, it's none of *my* business, I'm not an American citizen.)
Re:this does not look good for the judge. (Score:5, Insightful)
Nonsense. It's far to important to "ride it through". Decertify the machines, print a bunch of paper ballots, and hire a bunch of people to count them. Expensive? Yes. Worth it? If accurate elections aren't worth spending government money on, nothing is.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Same way governments get money for anything else: taxes.
I know those on the far right like to believe that somehow if we keep cutting taxes we'll raise government revenue - sort of like how internet bubble entrepreneurs would lose money on every sale, but make it up in volume. But it doesn't work that way.
Now, later, maybe some of that expense can be made up with lawsuits against the companies that provided the defective voting machines. And maybe money will
Re:this does not look good for the judge. (Score:4, Insightful)
An unfortunate situation that we are in now - in no small part because the majority of election officials have been playing the three wise monkeys over issues with voting systems.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
You're right, it goes go back 30 years easily, which also includes Carter (D) and Senator Proxmire (D) - you've read up on DIDMCA, right?
And it goes back further than that too... Nixon (R) ended the fixed price for gold...
And further back... Roosevelt (D) in 1933 set up Nixon to end gold standards by outlawing private gold ownership...
Even further - Salmon P. Chance (R), Secretary to Treasury under Lincoln (R), started nationalized currency, putting the new, post-civil war, centralized, federal government i
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh, money is definitely a commodity. I guess this is what I don't understand though:
So individual state or bank currencies were unable to complete.
Are state currencies even constitutional? "No state shall enter into any treaty, alliance, or confederation; grant letters of marque and reprisal; coin money; emit bills of credit; make anything but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts" I realize it says "coin" and not "print" but I would think that the intent is still the same.
As far as the bank currencies goes.... that's an interesting point. Dunno how to
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
This is a job for... (Score:4, Interesting)
Sounds like Sequoia is trying to avoid bad press (Score:5, Informative)
According to TFA the judge was reluctant to suppress the report. The lawyers for Sequoia Voting Systems, which was not a party to the lawsuit, basically told the Court some BS about the report, and the judge, wanting to be fair to Sequoia, reluctantly agreed to suppress it for now. My guess is that a redacted version, which strikes out Sequoia's trade secret information, will eventually be released.
Conspiracy theorists need to put away their tinfoil hats on this one. It's pretty obvious what's going on here.
Re:Sounds like Sequoia is trying to avoid bad pres (Score:3, Insightful)
Trade secrets in a voting machine? I know you aren't speaking from particular knowledge, but the very idea just reinforces my decision not to vote.
Trade Secrets (Score:5, Insightful)
Come on, we all know why this hasn't been released. Its because Sequoia will be claiming trade secrets based on their proprietary code. Now in a normal case this would make sense. If you made an aircraft engine control system that was 20% more efficient that the market average and someone in a court case claimed you used some of their code then you'd be pretty annoyed if your internal secrets were then published.
The issue here however is that this is about democracy and the counting of votes. There are no trade secrets in the counting of votes, it is a public process and it should be, indeed is required to be, publicly auditable. The problem here is that the Judge has applied commercial thinking to a public interest case, understandable but wrong.
There is a fundamental problem in the US right now around the audit and accountability of the democratic process. To borrow a phrase from the justice arena, Democracy mustn't just be done, it must seen to be done. A closed and proprietary voting system with no external verification does not enable this to happen. No-one in the US system (with its 98% re-elect rates) appears to care about this.
Now personally though the guy referenced here has done a good job in the write up I was personally more impressed that Brian Kernighan [wikipedia.org] was part of the review team.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Well, if it is trade secrets, this will make an interesting case.
A trade secret is supposed to be something that gives you an advantage. It's not supposed to be something that keeps you out of trouble.
I have a hard time believing that there any "secret sauce" in these kinds of systems, and if there could be it is well known in computer security that secret methods are actually really bad from a security standpoint, as illustrated by the safety of the gold in Fort Knox and the cash stuffed in grandpa's mat
Re:Trade Secrets (Score:4, Insightful)
Yes, but everyone in court has abused trade secrets so often that if I had a penny for every time I'd certainly be a billionaire. Remember the radar guns were claiming "trade secrets" too.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Its because Sequoia will be claiming trade secrets based on their proprietary code.
Yeah, it's a voting machine - how hard can it be? Oh I forgot. It takes some really creative code to not even be able to tally votes properly.
Re:Trade Secrets (Score:4, Interesting)
The gag order is to prevent an actual hacking event. These machines are in use in places outside NJ. By making this information available to the public prior the the election he'd be virtually ensuring tat there's be a breach, especially if as we suspect it's easy to crack the system.
This has little to do with trade secrets, which are often published, and which are protected by patents.
Parent
Trade secrets are by definition never published! (Score:5, Informative)
This has little to do with trade secrets, which are often published, and which are protected by patents.
You are completely and totally wrong on this.
FACTS
1. Trade secrets are never published. In fact the holder of a trade secret fails to protect it well enough and it is discovered, then it becomes public domain information.
2. Trade secrets and patents are mutually exclusive concepts. You either (a) choose to make something a trade secret and keep it secret, or (b) choose to publish information and patent the thing.
The reason patents were introduced is to create an incentive for companies to knowledge of an invention with the world around, and in exchange for that, the government gives the inventor exclusive rights to make money from that invention for a reasonable and limited time.
References
Patent or trade secret? [noreklaw.com]
Patent, Trademark, and Trade Secret [findlaw.com]
Parent
once again... (Score:5, Interesting)
I find myself posting this particular comment a lot in regards to voting issues...
Strangely enough, the last armed revolt against the government in the US was in Athens, Tn. in *1946*. The cause? Voting issues...
http://www.americanheritage.com/articles/magazine/ah/1985/2/1985_2_72.shtml [americanheritage.com] [americanheritage.com]
Not that I am advocating it, but it will be interesting to see just how PO'd folks will get...
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Technically that was against the *county* government.
I believe the last armed revolt against the Federal government was the Green Corn Rebellion [wikipedia.org] in 1917. It happened in that old reliable hotbed of left-wing activity, Oklahoma.
Just wrong (Score:3, Interesting)
This country has a serious mental problem in government. "of the people, by the people, and for the people" is not just a slogan, it is supposed to be the core value of the law.
I understand what the judge is doing, and in some circles it will be seen as a "responsible" thing to do. In a democracy, especially in a country that is supposed to be "for the people," it rings as cynical protection for an entity that actually harms "we the people" and our rights.
Author just another Dem Activist (Score:3, Informative)
Donating $4000 to Democrats hardly gives me a warm 'n fuzzy that Andy Appel's report or blog can be trusted to be objective. Since he is basically the plaintif as well, he has no reason to be objective either. That's fine I guess, but the media reports and his own blog suggest he is some kind of independant expert retained by the court, which is absolutely untrue and misleading.
And screw our objective
We have a good idea what is in the report (Score:3, Informative)
It probably doesn't make the machines look any better than the report on Sequoia machines done by the California Secretary of State (http://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/elections_vsr.htm) or the recent followup done by UCSB, including a video showing how even a paper trail version can be compromised (http://www.cs.ucsb.edu/~seclab/projects/voting/).
We know these machines are garbage, are easily manipulated, compromise the determination of the "consent of the governed", and thereby are threats to our democracy.
Tampering with voting machines and voting result reporting has been the basis of George Bush's presidency and has led to Republican victories in senate and governorship elections. For example, look at
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/Republican_IT_consultant_subpoenaed_in_case_0929.html [rawstory.com]
and
http://www.rawstory.com/news/2008/Documents_reveal_Georgia_was_warned_of_0730.html [rawstory.com]
and
http://web6.duc.auburn.edu/~gundljh/Baldwin.pdf [auburn.edu]
It will probably take many years to discover the scope of Republican election fraud. Eventually, history will record that banking deregulation, unaffordable tax cuts for the wealthy, failure to pursue alternative energy development (as a favor to the oil and gas industry), and many other of our nation's problems had their roots in voting machine manipulation.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re:So... (Score:5, Funny)
Wow, first he orders... then he orders...
And if "the company" did get into the judges pocket they would soon find out that Judge Linda Feinberg is a she.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
I actually read TFA. The questions you raise are answered (implied, really) there, and in addition you'd find that Judge Linda Feinberg is not a "he".
But that would spoil the fun of random speculation! :)
Re:So... (Score:5, Insightful)
actually what the judge did was completely right even though we dont like it publicly. She is temporarily withholding the findings until they meet in court to prevent a slew of issues that could crop up where it to be released prematurely. This happens all the time in the legal world but people often dont know it unless they are directly involved in the trial.
The findings WILL be made public, but only when the trial actually starts.
But then that isnt as sensational is it?
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
She is temporarily withholding the findings until they meet in court to prevent a slew of issues that could crop up where it to be released prematurely.
If the report is factual, we ought to hear it, and deal with those issues. Hiding the truth doesn't make it go away.
Re:So... (Score:4, Insightful)
We all have a duty to the truth, this judge is failing hers. Just because she has this discretion doesn't mean it's always right to use it.
If there are serious flaws in these voting machines, she owes it to the entire country to publish these results before the election, when something can be done about it. As we learned in 2000, and again in 2004, the voting system of any one precinct can affect the entire country. Therefore we all have a legitimate interest in it.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
The defendants had 30 days to review the report and make formal motions. They chose instead to make an unchallenged assertion of harm and ask for a stay without giving the plaintiffs a chance to refute the assertion. If 30 days is too short to make formal motions, the defendants should not have agreed to such a short timetable. Perhaps their intention all along was to suppress the report through "grossly mischaracteriz[ing]" it if it wasn't to their liking.
Re:So... (Score:5, Insightful)
Companies that deserve to tank deserve to be tank. There's no special god-given "right" to profitability. Oh it's a shame when people lose their jobs, and god knows I've lost enough money these past months on certain banks that have tanked, but this protectionism only encourages a sloppy attitude in a company insomuch as they feel they don't have to work anymore, they've "arrived", and now the "system" will protect them from anything.
Oh government, please bail us out because we've scammed our shareholders with creative accounting and billions of dollars worth of assets we've had on the books and borrowed money against aren't actually worth anything. Oh government, please hush up our "trade secrets" because our code is so simple even a 4 year old could reproduce it/any grandmother could debug it and point out how bad it is.
Businesses existed and were successful before the lawyers started bouncing around the concept of "intellectual property". It was about being first, being fastest, producing more product or higher quality, and actually competing. Coke has their "secret formula" - but that never stopped Pepsi or any other "cola" variety from existing. But people buy more Coke because of the marketing, not the "secret" formula. All intellectual property does is make money for lawyers. I suppose I should be thankful that every IP lawyer is one less ambulance chaser...
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Re:4759 is a prime number (Score:5, Funny)
Well, let's see 4 = D, right?
There 3 4's.
There are 4 1's and 4 > 3, so subtract 10 from the 31 factor and you get 21. 21=U
The first two digits of 326 are 3 and 2, the sum of which is 5. 5=E
So our first word is DUDE.
And I'm pretty sure the rest of the message has to do with thinking, because 4433 makes you think.
So, the message is:
"Dude, you are SOOOO overthinking this."
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